"The Money Masters" Documentary

Has anyone seen this documentary? It's called "The Money Masters"...

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8753934454816686947&q=%22the+money+masters%22&hl=en

I've just begun to watch it, and I have to say it's very thought-provoking.

Does anyone have any thoughts on it? Please share them.

Post 1

Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 10:23am

If you can create your own money supply, a money supply that you can defend from attackers and defrauders, and still have the money be extremely liquid, by all means go ahead. Can you do it without creating more money for yourself over time?

The USD competes against every other tradeable thing. The more people act to gain or keep USD, the more value the USD owners can gain by creating USD for themselves. But if they create too much for themselves, then people are going to shift from USD to some other tradeable secure liquid limited supply commodities.

As for the inflation, the idea is to not to save your value in USD, but to save it in something that will keep or gain its value over time. Currently, I think that index funds are an excellent choice. So you keep most of your value in index funds, and you keep a small amount of your value in a more liquid form (USD) for daily trading and emergencies.

Oh, and I didn't watch the video, it looks way to long! Where is the 15 minute version?
(Edited by Dean Michael Gores
on 4/25, 10:24am)

Post 2

Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 12:00pm

Dean,

Thanks for the reply, but what do you mean by "USD"? United States dollar? If so, okay.

The point of the documentary is to talk about how the Federal Reserve is an intentionally deceptively-named entity that is actually a private corporation, posing as government, and that, as a private corporation, it has been allowed to hold the task of printing the public money... namely, the USD. Apparently, the actual United States Government itself is not allowed to print its own money.

This is clearly taking privatization way too far, and violates even the spirit of what Ayn Rand was always talking about, which was privatization.

The video goes into depth, exposing the influence of the world banks and, in particular, the Rothschild ("red shield") family's machinations since the 1700's to corrupt and dominate the integrity of the world's economies through unethical strategies and even war instigation, so that they can hold onto the reins of supreme power which, apparently, they still do, along with their major subsidiary, select partners all around the world.

Before even this, the narrator and producer, Bill Still, reveals that the improper and corrupt handling of monetary systems has caused the bulk of the world's collapses and misery since even the fall of Rome, when mishandling of the monetary system led to an ultimate degradation and collapse of that society.

It's a truly amazing video, whether it's entirely right or wrong. I'm astonished that you don't want to at least try watching it.

(Edited by Jeremy M. LeRay on 4/25, 12:16pm)

Post 3

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 3:11am

This is clearly taking privatization way too far, and violates even the spirit of what Ayn Rand was always talking about, which was privatization.

I would have to technically disagree. The FED may be private, but i benefits from certain laws enforced by our governmen, i.e. legal tender laws. So in the sense you could say that they are in cahoots. Have you read Rothbard's "The Case Against The Fed"? I'm about halfway through it right now.

Post 4

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 9:23am

Here is a private currency, Traverse City "Bay Bucks":
http://www.michigancoinclub.org/Baybucks.htm
and another story about them:
http://www.northernexpress.com/editorial/features.asp?id=138

You do not need governments or banks to have money:
http://www.textfiles.com/magazines/PAO/pao-9310.txt
(Scroll down about one-third of the way until you get to
MONEY WITHOUT GOVERNMENT AND BANKS (21aug93)
by Michael E. Marotta mercury@well.sf.ca.us

Read more about "Community Currency" here:
http://www.communitycurrency.org/
and here:

Local currency
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In economics, a local currency, in its common usage, is a currency not backed by a national government (and not necessarily legal tender), and intended to trade only in a small area. These currencies are also referred to as community currency. They encompass a wide range of forms, both physically and financially, and often are associated with a particular economic discourse.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_currency

and here:
http://www.transaction.net/money/community/
and (if you need a dose of rightwing to balance the left):
http://www.communitycurrencyassociation.com/

Post 5

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 10:53am

I would have to technically disagree. The FED may be private, but i benefits from certain laws enforced by our governmen, i.e. legal tender laws. So in the sense you could say that they are in cahoots. Have you read Rothbard's "The Case Against The Fed"? I'm about halfway through it right now.

No, I haven't read that Rothbard book, but I will, now.

The only reason I went looking for the "Money Masters" documentary is that I was told Milton Friedman was a fan of it.

Post 6

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 11:47am

Michael,

Very fascinating article you wrote. I very much appreciate the value of it.

One of the things I like about the "Money Masters" documentary is that the narrator, Bill Stills, points out that what ultimately makes a given form of money "work" or not, is whether the government insists that citizens can pay their taxes with it. In other words, if they wish to be included as full members of the community, they have to pay taxes back to the government to do so.

How this makes money circulate between members of the society is not something I currently understand, however. After all, how would the money make it into the hands of individuals in the first place? Would a "money man" just go skipping down the streets at regular intervals, tossing out currency from a neon-covered wheelbarrow or something? What would be their incentive to use it for transactions, instead of just putting it somewhere and never using it, until it was time to pay their taxes?

I have a feeling that there's more to things than meets the eye here. Is money merely an infectious sort of fetish? Is that all there is to its reason for being used? And, if it's merely fetish, is its use as such something that is cultivated through psychological tricks and manipulations somehow? Or is its use forced through social engineering somehow. I would very much like specific answers to these questions.

Post 7

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 4:58pm

Speaking of Rothbard, "What Has Government Done to Our Money?" is another excellent choice, and is available for free online. And since you mentioned Friedman, I gained more from reading Hazlett's "Economics in One Lesson" and Rothbard's "For a New Liberty", than Friedman's "Free to Choose" (although it was still worth reading).

Post 8

Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 8:00pm

Mr. JMLR wrote: ... what ultimately makes a given form of money "work" or not, is whether the government insists that citizens can pay their taxes with it. I... How this makes money circulate between members of the society is not something I currently understand...

Right, well, that shows the fallacy of this right wing (and leftwing) thinking about the Federal Reserve and the Treasury and all. In this model, money gets into the economy only when the government buys things or hires people. From there, it circulates. That makes government the engine of creation. They might like to think of themselves that way...

First of all, most of what we really do is -- as you suggested -- highly abstracted "an infectious sort of fetish" what Richard Dawkins called a "meme" a self-replicating idea. Evolution is seamless. Even when you can point to "cataclysms" or "events" the forms before and after are similar. So, both the day before and the day after Pres. Roosevelt closed the banks and demonetized gold, money still looked a lot like money. The same was true when clad coinage replaced silver. For a contrast to that from another sector, the Japanese never were big on check books. The writing style had something to do with it, but basically, they went directly from cash to plastic in one generation. So, again, money was highly abstracted, several steps away from surplus commodities being exchanged.

Money is whatever people accept for money. Gold has a lot of fine qualities, but it is not good for everything. If Bill Gates were to liquidate Microsoft for gold,-- say $8 billion worth at $800 per ounce -- he would need a troup of about 10,000 guys carrying 100 lbs each. I think that electronic funds transfer has that beat. ... which opens the door (or floodgates) to electronic money.

I own a facsimile of Webster's 1828 Dictionary of the American Language, which I bought from a Christian bookstore using e-gold that I earned by selling articles to a libertarian website.

At the November 2006 convention of the Michigan State Numismatic Society, I paid the speakers at our Educational Forum with "Convention Scrip" that I created and which the officers counter-signed so that it could be spent on the bourse floor.

Money is whatever people are willing to accept as money.

Post 9

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 3:10am

Following up on what Michael said, money is whatever people are willing to accept as money, but there are two characteristics that all commonly accepted monies share. Divisibility, and coincidence of wants. For example in ancient times, a plow may have been desired by most if not all, but it was not divisible, i.e., if you cut it in half, it loses all value, so you would have to trade the whole thing. But what if you only want a loaf of bread? Clearly that would not be an even trade, so you would have to find someone selling what the baker wants, who is willing to trade you for your plow. You could trade the plow for a 1000 eggs, and then trade 2 eggs for the loaf of bread. So money has to be divisible, but it also has to be demanded by a large percentage of the population.

Post 10

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 6:49am

You've both missed the point here.. this whole discussion has somehow become a Victorian garden frolic into whimsical academia. Perhaps I didn't make things clear enough.

The point here is the documentary itself. It's contending that the majority of the world's geopolitical and socioeconomic troubles are caused by a "fractional reserve" monetary policy started by the Rothschild family back in the 1600's and continued all the way to our current day, with the Federal Reserve, Bank of England and the World Banks.

Apparently, this seemingly "sacred" policy is really nothing more than leveraging loans and money based on really having only 1/10 of the reserves you claim to have, and then charging very high interest on those loans, to make a very high profit in order to "cheat" out the disparity.

This quickly becomes passed along like ripples in a stream, until everybody exists in a permanent state of terror and instability, while those at the top are able to amass an inescapable strangulation of entirely debt-based wealth, and quickly come to dictate a system by which world economies and economic disparities are artificially created, enhanced, and maintained through the constriction of money and manipulations of the interest rate.

What's more, they can actually create cataclysmic wars for no other reason than to consolidate their power, influence, and stability, just by propping up and heavily subsidizing enemy armies to fight each other. And, as the armies come to depend more and more on heavily debt-based funding, whoever wins ultimately means that the bankers really come out the winners.

War on Terrorism, anyone?

This possible state of affairs as I've just conveyed from the documentary doesn't concern anybody but me?

(Edited by Jeremy M. LeRay on 4/27, 6:52am)

Post 11

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 7:24am

Granted the fractional reserve system is always going to cause economic problems, but as conspiracy theories go... that's hardly a new one.

Post 12

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 8:50am

Well, it may not be new and chic, but it's enormously important and destructive, apparently. That such a banking philosophy -- apparently based on pure subjectivism -- has become accepted as a "standard, traditional" and, even, "legitimate" form of banking is beyond terrifying.

It never ceases to astound, the things people simply and thoughtlessly allow to happen, with little or no thought of the enormous danger of implications.

(Edited by Jeremy M. LeRay on 4/27, 8:52am)

Post 13

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 10:01am

That is because it is conspiracy theory bunk - and it often goes hand in hand with Zionist conspiracy theories, the Bilderburgers and the rest. Study some economics first - these people have no idea what they are talking about. Money is simply a means to an exchange, and fractional banking does not artificially create wealth at all - the wealth has to be there in the form of businesses and the rest - but there is only so much chance that there will be complete failures so enough "cash" has to be available to cover those eventualities. There are tons of wiki articles - lots of debate - but you could just buy gold or barter if you think it is so terrible.

Post 14

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 11:08am

I'm with Kurt. I suggest Merchants Make History by Ernst Samhaber, but many other histories are just as factual. The kings, emperors, barons, etc., used force of arms to extort money from bankers. They would "call a conference" with the banker and ask for a "loan." You saw what happened to Braveheart -- and he was a warrior. What chance does a banker have when surrounded by guys with sharp objects?

King John, King Richard, King Edward, King Charles, King Louis, put the Roman numerals where you want them, they defaulted on their loans and then expelled the lenders from their lands.

These anti-capitalist conspiracy theories are table fare for the fascist right and bolshevik left alike. They both hate "bourgeois liberalism" with its rational-empirical machinery and both dream of a green garden of utopia where work is not required and nothing ever changes.

Also, to bring this to a point, just how do the Wonderbreaders and Hamburgers actually "consolidate their power" by destroying the infrastructure around them?

PS
Personally, I don't care how much "power" or "wealth" anyone else has. I am only concerned with what I can get for myself.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 4/27, 11:14am)

Post 15

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 12:59pm

That is because it is conspiracy theory bunk - and it often goes hand in hand with Zionist conspiracy theories, the Bilderburgers and the rest. Study some economics first - these people have no idea what they are talking about. Money is simply a means to an exchange, and fractional banking does not artificially create wealth at all - the wealth has to be there in the form of businesses and the rest - but there is only so much chance that there will be complete failures so enough "cash" has to be available to cover those eventualities. There are tons of wiki articles - lots of debate - but you could just buy gold or barter if you think it is so terrible.

You might at least survey the terrain before you start drawing a map of it. How do you know it's "bunk" unless you watch at least some of it.

Post 16

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 5:56pm

Mr. JMLR -- You might at least survey the terrain before you start drawing a map of it. How do you know it's "bunk" unless you watch at least some of it.

Post 17

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 7:33pm

None Dare Call it Conspiracy by Gary Allen (1971) -- has it been that long... seems like just yesterday...

Illuminatus! by Wilson and Shea

How about, The Occult Technology of Power, now that's one you don't hear of.
So you've shown me there are others. Fair enough. But those are not necessarily carbon-copies of this one. There are no guarantees that this is just another one of those.

I will look for those, too, to watch. But as far as you go, there is no substitute for actually watching this documentary, than actually watching it.

Post 18

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 10:40pm

They are not carbon copies because they precede The Money Masters by 30 years.

I am about 30 minutes through The Money Masters and it is the same old mishmash of conservative populism supported by biblical scripture. (Some here might approve that, actually.)

Among the many claims is that the Federal Reserve has been destroying the American economy since 1913. How have we managed to survive for nearly 100 years?

The film speaks against interest -- though allowing "fees" to offset risk.

The history of Rome is osterized (run through a blender) at best. There were no Roman "emperors" before Augustus and certainly none in 48 BC. Despite what the film claims, the coins of Julius Caesar were in not special. It is true -- the film is mute on this point -- that other men (moneyers, elected in pairs) struck coins honoring Julius Caesar. As the film notes, Julius Caesar used these coins to win popular support -- though he did not build the Colloseum as hinted.

This is all just from the first 30 minutes.
More later... But, again, there are political conservatives here, so do not be discouraged that the first responses were not supportive.

Post 19

Friday, April 27, 2007 - 10:48pm